Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Arrival of spring

That's just a joke, really, the arrival of spring.  It was -16 on Monday morning, -6 yesterday, and 8 today.  We got about 4" of fresh powder Saturday night.  I punched through the snow on my way to the bird feeder on Sunday and the snow was up to mid-thigh.  And I wasn't yet touching bare ground.  I'm not one to bitch & moan (though there may be those who disagree with that...) but this is getting a bit tiresome.  Most people around here are disgusted and dreary about the weather and lack of anything resembling spring.  I'm tired of winter, yes, but still not as frustrated and yearning for a new season as I often am by now.

Friends had a problem with their septic system yesterday because their leach field is frozen, which caused a back up in the septic tank.  Yikes, this is something they've feared all winter, because we had sub-zero weather long before we had a decent snow cover.  Oh how we take a flushing toilet for granted.  My leach field is always plowed over because it's where I park my car.  This should make it more vulnerable to freezing--and indeed it may be frozen--but I've never had septic problems.  I think about it often because I've never had my tank pumped out, but it's a 1500 gallon tank and I live alone so I lull myself into a false sense of security.  Oh how I hope I don't have septic problems--I do not know exactly where the septic tank is.  And the ground is frozen right now.

Ah, that was a cheerful subject.  More cheer--the dogs disappeared for 4 hours the other night, which of course upset me.  They were at the neighbors' house, a mile away, and having a great time.  They must have covered a lot of ground because I saw fresh prints going toward Silver Lake Camp that evening, during one of my forays into finding them.  All of which were unsuccessful.  I just waited and they came home eventually and boy were they exhausted.

Tomorrow I take my car to the dealer for what had better be the last chapter of this ridiculous deer impact episode.  I'm fed up with the whole thing.  But I still like my car.  But I think I want a new one.  But now is not the best time to be buying one.  But the dealer in Burlington keeps sending me good offers on a new car.  but but but.

I had friends come for cocktails Sat. eve, which meant I spent the entire day cleaning.  My routine is to clean, rest, clean, rest, clean, rest, etc.  That makes for a long day of cleaning.  I did go to the dump, and to town to buy wine, but other than that I worked hard to make the house presentable.  What I discovered is that my house is very dirty in places and needs a thorough cleaning.  Like, with cleaners and water.  The living room floor needs to be repainted but boy oh boy is that a chore.  Lin helped me do that a long time ago.  We took all the furniture out to the deck and it started to rain.  Lightly, but rain.  I put two coats on the floor and now there are places where the paint is worn off.  Is this something I consider a priority?  No, not really.  The refrigerator needs cleaning inside and out.  The kitchen floor needs attention.  The bedroom floor is a mess because it's maple that wasn't kiln-dried and it was never treated with anything much so it's totally stained and ugly.  There's the floor I should paint.  But that's a problem because the bed is there to stay.  It's a queen-size bed that Jamie built and it's heavy and impossible to move.  It needs to be taken apart for that, and Lin & I struggled to put it back together after moving it from the master bedroom.  Oh how I do go on.  ANYWAY, it was a nice visit with friends Sat. night.

I've registered for a Cooperative Extension workshop on garden design that's this Saturday.  Lasts all day, which doesn't thrill me, but it sounds good.  I would like to resurrect my gardens and maybe this will inspire me.  Plus they're going to cover container gardening, which is pretty much all I do now.  I used to have 4 definite gardens but grass and weeds and blackberry bushes have taken over.  I used to grow vegetables but got tired of doing that because the dogs always ate whatever I grew before I could harvest it.  They even dug up carrots.  Each year I say I will NOT try to grow cucumbers and tomatoes in containers, but each year I'm wooed by the cute little seedlings and try again.  With no real luck.

Tonight we're supposed to have snow, sleet, freezing rain and misery.  Spring?  What's that?

No comments:

Post a Comment